Slab
by LogicMouse
Summary: My brief attempt, from autumn 2010, to mess around with the announced first line of the novella, "Aftermath." Told from Karrin Murphy's point of view.


**Slab**

_**The Dresden Files belongs to Jim Butcher. No copyright infringement or insult intended. This story is presented under the Creative Commons as derivative, non-commercial fiction.**_

I still can't believe he's dead.

I stand in the chilly, antiseptic morgue, staring down at his long, cold, skinny corpse–fish-belly pale, expressionless and stiff–and I still think it's some kind of trick. It has to be. One small, bloody hole; one tiny, average, everyday bullet could not possibly be enough to remove such a primal force from this world.

I focus on my breathing; slow, calm and controlled–as smooth as I would keep it in the middle of a difficult kata. I can hear the ragged, half-stifled inhalations of the man beside me, and I know Butters couldn't keep even that much control if I let myself go, so I don't.

Couldn't let the pig see me getting all broken up over him, anyway. Not that he'll have a chance to gloat now.

I blink and look away from the empty face on the slab, stepping a few feet off, poking at the papers piled up on Butters' desk. "You really think you'll be okay to do the autopsy?" I ask. God, how can my voice be so cool? Perfectly composed and professional when my insides are all broken glass. "I'm surprised Brioche even agreed to it."

I hear the skinny M.E. blow his nose; long, harsh and obnoxious, before he can answer. "Doctor high and mighty had no interest," he growls, in a voice too grim for him. "Just a straightforward GSW, he said. Totally routine." Butters laughs a little. "He's gonna kill me when he sees all the tests I'm going to order."

I turn to look at him. The small man (only two or three inches taller than _my_ minuscule height for Chrissakes) has a surprisingly happy expression on his face. A strange, smug little smile. "What tests?" I ask. "What do you expect to find?"

"Oh, I dunno," he answers, with a cheerful little tilt of his head. "Maybe nothing. Maybe the answer to the great question of Life, the Universe and Everything."

I glare at him, waiting to see if he's going to start making sense any time soon, or if I should go call one of his colleagues to cart him away. He smiles sadly at my expression, and takes a step closer to the slab, staring down at the body. His hands rise in a gesture of benevolent demonstration; presenting–for a limited time only–Harry Dresden, corpse.

"How often does an opportunity like this come along, Karrin? For someone who knows what they're looking at to do a complete examination of an actual wizard, without any interference from his Mu-" he winces, glances up at me, hesitating. "his weird effect on technology. I'm going to run every test I can authorize. This'll be the single most thorough exam I've done in my whole career."

He meets my eyes again, a bright sheen making them dance. "If I'm _really_ good, and maybe a little lucky, I might just be able to find some clue about what made him tick. How it works. It's the last, best thing I can do for him." His hand comes to rest on the body's scarred shoulder, friendly and comfortable as only a coroner can be with the dead. "The last thing he can do for me, too."

"Oh," I say, stupidly. Hard to believe it to look at him, but I guess Butters really is a scientist down to the bone. I open my mouth to admit that I'm a little impressed, but before anything has a chance to come out, the door swings wide, admitting my old friend, Agent Tilly.

Another guy only a few inches taller than me. Huh. How messed up is it, that I already miss standing in the shade?

"Karrin, there you are," he says, brisk and calm as always. He clasps my hand, and presses his other palm against my shoulder, a hair more than professionally consoling. "I asked them not to send you back till I got here." His glance at the body on the slab is brief, but unflinching. We've seen plenty of bodies in our line of work, and Harry was no more to him than a suspect. Or witness. Or conundrum, anyway. "I'm sorry for your loss, Karrin. I know you two were more than just friends."

I tilt my head at that, eyes narrowing in old, paranoid habit; teasing out shades of insinuation. "No," I snap. "We were _exactly_ friends. Nothing more–and nothing less–than _best_ friends, Till. And anyone who tells you different is a liar."

"Whoa, there, Murphy," he says, withdrawing his hands as though worried I'll bite. "Ease up on the neurosis, I didn't mean anything bad by it."

I clench my jaw, and turn away from him, biting back an even harsher response. After a few more calm, steady breaths I can answer honestly. "I'm sorry, Barry. That's kind of a sore point, is all."

Tilly raises his eyebrows, then glances up at Butters, as though to send him away. I shake my head, gently. Anything I'm willing to say to Tilly, Butters can hear too. I find myself shuffling slowly closer to the body on the slab, hands tight around my own arms as though to ward off the cold.

I look down at his face again. It seems drawn and careworn even in death. Better shaven than usual, though. Oh, God. He'd just gotten cleaned up for _me_. I raise my eyes to the ceiling, blinking and focusing on my breathing for another long moment. "It wasn't for lack of trying," I mutter. "On his part. He offered a couple of times, and I turned him down." My breath gets a little rougher, and I stop for a moment, but the need has risen to tell someone, and I can't think of anyone better, just now. Maybe can't hold it back. Maybe shouldn't.

"And today. Ah, hell. He'd lost just about everything in the world the last couple of days. And when I . . . When I tracked him down to that old tub, and we talked." I shake my head. "I couldn't say no again. Didn't want to." I look up to meet Tilly's eyes for a moment, breaking the contact quickly out of sheer habit. Huh. How much have I bent my reflexes around, to accommodate Harry'shandicaps? No need, anymore. I look up, staring challengingly into my friend's–the FBI agent's–eyes, and say, "That's why I came back to the boat. When I found him. When I was there about an hour before, we'd. . .made a date. I went home to get cleaned up, and when I came back for him," I wave a hand helplessly at the room, head shaking meaningless negation.

"I'm sorry." He means it more, this time.

My eyes focus again, and I give each of them an equal, level glare. "If either of you so much as breathes a word of this, I swear I'll take both of your kneecaps." Butters looks honestly intimidated by the threat, but Tilly smirks a little, trusting me.

"We won't," Butters stammers, "Ah, I won't, I mean." His weak chin rises, and I see that rare flash of strength he's shown since I came back from my Hawaiian vacation. "Your secret's safe with me."

I can't help but smile. "I know it is, Polka-boy," I say, using Harry's nickname for him, even though it hurts a little. "You're good at keeping your mouth shut."

"My position is a bit more delicate, you know." Tilly's voice is calm, but not happy. "He was under investigation by my office. He was murdered. I'm going to be doing a lot of paperwork about this." He meets my eyes again, frowning with honest concern for me. "But I'll keep things as vague as I can on that point."

I have to look away, a little embarrassed. I hadn't quite thought through that angle, and I should have. If I had an ounce of political sense, I shouldn't even have admitted to being anywhere near the _Water Beetle_ today, but it was too late for that when I dialed 911.

I nod acknowledgement of that, hating the stiff quiver in my neck, and mutter, "Thank you."

"It's nothing. Really." He pauses uncomfortably. "If pressed, I'll have to pass on what you said. But I'll avoid it if I can."

I give him a small, tight smile. "You're a disgustingly honest man, Till. You know that, right?"

He nods, "Mm hmm."

"Could I . . . be alone for a while?" I ask. It's not quite according to procedure, but- "Butters can stay, I just–" can't seem to finish a sentence, at the moment.

"Sure." He glances at the M.E., as though checking that he's okay being alone with me. Butters nods confidently, and Tilly heads out, probably to start digging into all that paperwork.

Idly, I wonder if they'll find the shooter, or if everything will get buried, now that their 'best' bombing suspect is dead. Good thing it was a rifle round, or they might try to call it suicide. Wouldn't that be fun.

"So you really think you can figure out what makes a wizard a wizard, huh?"

Butters ducks his head, waggles it uncertainly. "I hope so. I'm not likely to get a second chance." He looks up at me, suddenly. "You don't . . . mind, do you? I mean, as executor of his estate-"

"No, Butters. I don't mind." I sigh. "I don't know how Harry would have felt about it, but I think it'll make a fine legacy." I blink a couple of times. That reminds me. "Speaking of legacies, where's that necklace he always wore? The silver star in a circle?"

"Oh, right. Thanks for reminding me." Butters bustles over to the storage lockers, searches out one drawer, and pulls out a small plastic evidence bag. He brings it back, holds it out to me. "Already dusted for prints. Nothing useable but his own, so it's not evidence."

I accept the oddly heavy little package, brush the chain out of the way to stare for a moment at the battered silver pentacle. A symbol of magic, so Harry said, but to me a symbol of him. Just him. Where'd the little red stone in the middle come from? I don't remember that. The huge glob of rubber cement apparently holding it in place certainly has Harry written all over it.

I can't help but smile. Tilly was right. As a bomb-maker, Dresden would have been a disaster. Not a careful bone in his body.

I should give this to his daughter, before she leaves town. At least she could have something to– to what? To _remember_ him by? The poor girl's been seriously traumatized. She's hardly likely to recall that huge, black armored figure as anything but one more glimpse out of nightmare. I'm not even sure I want to try explaining to her who he was. I close my eyes. What a mess that is.

My fingers clench around the pendant, as my mind runs over the horrors of last night, and the things I saw in that Mayan ruin. What I did. What Harry did. What he had to do. And the rest.

My phone rings, shockingly loud in the quiet room, making me and Butters jump halfway out of our skins. I grimace apologetically at him and check the caller ID. It's a private residence, in the city, but I don't recognize the name.

"Murphy," I answer, cool and polite, just in case it's important.

"Sergeant? Oh, good." It's a man's voice, middle-aged, sounds distressed. Before I can decide to correct him about my lost title, he goes on. "My name is Mortimer Lindquist, and I have a message.

"Harry needs to talk to you."


End file.
